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Wednesday, November 28, 2012

Getting the Kinks Out (Again)

The first big-name rock star I ever interviewed, in my early days at Crawdaddy in early 1971, was one of my musical heroes, Ray Davies of the Kinks. They were in the midst of their "Lola" comeback period but Ray still told me, "I think I am totally mad." He had recently stabbed his brother Dave with a fork when Dave reached for his chips. Nice guy, though. That night, at Philharmonic Hall in NYC, Ray was so drunk he stumbled backyards toward an elevated amp. Brother Dave casually stepped out of the way and let Ray fall into it--and it nearly toppled on top of him. Ray, flat on his back, kept sing, "I'm an Ape man, I'm an Ape-Ape man." Then he got up and balanced a beer can on his head. Finally he insisted the audience sing along with what he called "the greatest fucking song ever written," namely, "You Are My Sunshine."

is author of a dozen books (click on covers at right), including the new "THE TUNNELS: Escapes Under the Berlin Wall and the Historic Films the JFK White House Tried to Kill." He was the longtime editor of Editor & Publisher. Email: epic1934@aol.com. Twitter: @GregMitch

5 comments:

In the late seventies I saw the kinks play in santa barbara. half way through the show, dave, for a reason unknown, flung his guitar at ray. the show stopped. the boys went back stage for a talk. show resumed twenty minutes later.

I was not that familiar with the Kinks. Though I liked their music, I never had the opportunity to see them Vancouver, nor had I ever been aware that they ever had been. They were different; I didn't know if they were still together in the fall of 1974 when I travelled across Canada by train with a few of my friends, having recently graduated from high school. We met a young man on our way to Montreal who was returning from a Kinks convention that was held in the United States. I found that intriguing...a band that held conventions. It made me wonder what was so special about them to attract that kind of devotion. What was it about them that made people do that? In that way they were kind of like the Grateful Dead with their Deadheads.

I was not that familiar with the Kinks. Though I liked their music, I never had the opportunity to see them Vancouver, nor had I ever been aware that they ever had been. They were different; I didn't know if they were still together in the fall of 1974 when I travelled across Canada by train with a few of my friends, having recently graduated from high school. We met a young man on our way to Montreal who was returning from a Kinks convention that was held in the United States. I found that intriguing...a band that held conventions. It made me wonder what was so special about them to attract that kind of devotion. In that way they were kind of like the Grateful Dead and Deadheads.

During one of their concerts Ray introduced Dave by saying the following ". . . my brother, Dave's gonna sing a song for ya. He's NOT much of a songwriter. What d'ya think, Dave? Got lucky on this one did ya?" Dave was so humiliated and angered he couldn't utter a word and the intro to Death of a Clown died as did all the air of their performance.

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